Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Wednesday, May 25, 2016

I caught a short commercial for a documentary and didn't get the details but the conversation stuck with me. A black American footballer was being interviewed and he was talking about all the games he had played. He said that whenever he walks out onto the field and sees 80,000+ people sitting in the stadium, he always scans the crowd.

I anticipated what he was about to say and was completely taken by surprise when he said 'I am always looking for that one face, my dad, but he is never there.'

So many men are growing up without fathers, both physically and psychologically. And the damage is huge, it may be apparent as in the case of criminal behaviour, or it may be more subtle as in the case of men who cannot accept authority, be it from a boss or another family member. And as I am observing recently, a man without a father will have great difficulty coming to know his heavenly Father and how to trust him. He has never been shown the earthly foreshadowing of that relationship.

When that first relationship is broken, the man is left to face the world on his own or with only the feminine parent who really can't fight these battles for him.

I once heard Dr. Dobson talking about his prison ministry. They decided to give the prisoners mother's day cards to send to their moms. They were overwhelmed by the demand and had to place another order. Almost every prisoner wanted to send his mom a card. So they thought, reasonably enough, that they should do the same on father's day. So they ordered father's day cards and had them available when that day rolled around. While they could barely fill the demand for mother's day cards, there was not one single request for a father's day card.

Fatherlessness, it is a plague in our society. And well-meaning legislators try to fill the gap with social programs and government benefits. But nothing can really replace the real dad for a young man growing up without one.